Some of the very first things that were added when I created the Historical Archives were maps I found thanks to the Library of Congress. It was interesting to see the network of railroads in the country grow in size exponentially through the 1800′s, and then later in the mid 1900′s crash and quite a few disappeared. There was one map, however, that caught my attention.

That map lists a station along the Harlem Line: Golding’s Bridge. Was it a typo? In the back of my mind I had always wondered about the apostrophe thing. Is Goldens Bridge written properly with an apostrophe, or without? And now, a new question. What is Golding’s Bridge? For whom was the town named, and does the bridge still exist? Why are other stations on this map, or other maps also listed with apostrophes? Brewster’s, Pawling’s? The map also lists quite a few stations that have different names today, such as Hart’s Corners, Whitlockville, and Bains.

In my endeavor to find the answer to at least the apostrophe question, I consulted with the town historian of Lewisboro, of which Goldens Bridge is a part of. She unfortunately told me that she could only “add to the confusion.”

I’m not exactly sure where the original bridge that gave your hamlet its name first stood, but it spanned the Croton River, which is now under the reservoir. The bridge may have belonged to a gentleman called Golding, Goulding, or Colden. I have heard all of these names. That bridge had to have been an important crossing to get to what is now Somers, and points west. It most certainly dates to the Revolution or before.

In 2003, Metro North dropped the apostrophe from the name of the station. Almost all official timetables and signage refer to the station as Goldens Bridge. However, old signage with the apostrophe does still exist. The station listing on M-7 trains still has the apostrophe. Most official town signage also does not have the apostrophe. However the Fire Department for the town still uses it. Google maps still uses it. It is a name still in transition.

Many towns and names along the Harlem Line went through similar transitions. Spellings were changed, apostrophes were dropped. Brewster’s and Pawling’s are both evidence of that. Some names changed completely. So let’s take a little tour through the area and see how some of these names came to be, shall we?

Bronx – Named for Jonas Bronck, who purchased the land in 1639. Originally known as The Bronck’s, in reference to the family, at some point over time the spelling evolved into the current form.
Mott Haven – Named for Jordan Mott, who had an ironworks that opened in 1828. He purchased the land from the Morris family.
Morrisania – Named for the Morris family. Lewis Morris was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Gouverneur Morris was also a prominent member of that family.
Woodlawn – Originally two words, but was condensed into one by 1870.
Mount Vernon – Named for George Washington’s home. Original name was Hunt’s Bridge.
Fleetwood – Named for the ancestral home of John Stevens.
Scarsdale – Named for the ancestral home of Caleb Heathcote.
Hartsdale – Named after Eleazar Hart, who donated the land. Was previously known as Hart’s Corners.
Bedford Hills - Originally named only Bedford, the Hills was added to the name in 1910.
Katonah – Had several previous names, first was Mechanicsville. Later changed to Whitlockville in 1830, for the Whitlock family. Later renamed Katonah from the native word Ketatonah, which translates to Great Mountain.
Purdys – Named for Daniel Pardieus, his grandson Isaac donated the land to the railroad in 1844.
Brewster – Named for brothers James and Walter Brewster, and at the time was known as Brewster’s.
Dykemans – Named for Joseph Dykeman.
Patterson – Named for Matthew Paterson, older maps list the name with only one ‘t’
Pawling – Named for the Paulding (possibly Pauling) family.
Wingdale – Named for the Wing family. Jackson Wing operated an Inn which opened in 1806. Previous names include Wing’s Station, and South Dover.
Harlem Valley – Wingdale - Harlem Valley comes from the name of the railroad (New York & Harlem). Used to be two stops, State Hospital (actual name of the hospital was Harlem Valley State Hospital) and Wingdale (mentioned above). Wingdale station was eliminated, and later Metro-North combined the two and the name.
Millerton – named for Sydney G. Miller, who was an engineer and contractor for the construction between Dover Plains and Chatham.
Craryville – Named for Peter Crary. Station was previously known as Bains, or Bains Corners for hotel owner Peter Bain.
Martindale – Named for John Martin.
Philmont – Previous name was Phillips Mountain, but was later condensed into Philmont. Named for George Phillips, who built a dam and a mill in the area.
Chatham – Named for Lord Pitts, Earl of Chatham, England.

That list does not mention every station on the current Harlem Line, or the rail line in the past. I am specifically mentioning stations that were named after people, or had a name change of some sort. Apostrophes in names often originated because the land was named after, or originally belonged, to a specific family or person.

Just in case you aren’t paying attention to my posts over on Twitter, the Harlem Line has some big delays today. Around two hours ago, there were 15–20 minute delays between North White Plains and Wassaic due to trees fouling the tracks near Hawthorne. The issues with downed trees got bad enough that about an hour ago service was suspended in both directions from North White Plains to Brewster. The newest update from Metro North is that there will be continued delays in both directions, and passengers will be bused between Pleasantville and Mount Kisco. If you are going to be riding the trains this afternoon, Metro North’s Train Time may be helpful. If you aren’t already, signing up for MTA alerts is also a good idea. I of course will be reposting those alerts on twitter whenever they become available. (Even though Metro North has a twitter account now, they don’t seem to be posting that information there).

So I happened to encounter an article that was in Danbury’s News-Times this morning, regarding an event happening tomorrow (Thursday) at the Brewster train station. The event is a Prayer Vigil and Walk for Peace, concerning immigration reform in the United States. I’m seriously one of the last people to be advertising anything that contains the word “prayer” in it, but I must admit I found the article interesting.

If you’ve taken the train from Brewster, you know there are many immigrants, and probably also many illegal immigrants in the area. I mentioned in a previous post of a past incident where I took the train from Brewster, and while standing in the crosswalk waiting to go to the station, a man stopped for me and shouted out his window, “’ll only stop for you because you’re a white girl!” It was obvious what he was referencing… I was not one of “those immigrant people” that frequent the area around the station.

I certainly thought that the people of Brewster will remember the incident that happened in June, where a mother and her eight-year-old daughter were killed outside a dance studio in Brewster. A drunken, unlicensed and illegal Guatemalan immigrant driving a truck plowed into the two, killing them. Just searching for a link to this story, I find so much hatred, like this gem:

I volunteer to feed this piece of garbage into a wood chipper alive with his hands taped to his ankles

These animals must be dealt with. If the government does not do something, someone will.

But as the article states, think of Diane Schuler, the driver in a deadly incident on the Taconic Parkway. Investigators found this American citizen to be both drunk and high, and driving on the wrong side of the road. Eight people lost their lives in that crash, several of them young children. In incidents like these, maybe one should not be blaming illegal immigrants, but drunken drivers.

And with all this hate, maybe a place like Brewster does need an event like this.

Prayer Vigil and Walk for Peace in our Community
Thursday, October 15, 2009, 7PM
Metro North Railroad Station, Brewster, NY
For more information call 845-225-4698
or e-mail Charlieg424@comcast.net

The other day I caught sight of the amusing radio repairman that I dubbed Bob in a previous entry… he was carrying a plate of food, and thankfully didn’t get into any awkward conversations with anyone. He did get up and go to the little conductor vestibule, and got on his hands and knees and looked under the door, and through the window in order to see if anyone was in there. Alas, nobody was. He returned to his seat, shouted out “Mount Kisco!” for no apparent reason a few times, and then got off the train.

Here are a bunch of other random memories that have come to mind recently… some are new and some are old!

While eating lunch at a place across the street from the Valhalla train station, I heard a trio of blondes get into a very heated discussion about dog food.
“You can’t buy your dog Kibbles and Bits, it is BAD!”
“What do you mean, BAD?”
“It is just bad, Iams is better. You get it from the pet store.”
“But why is Iams better?”
“Well, the lady said that giving your dog Kibbles and Bits, is like eating at MCDONALD’S every day! It is FAST FOOD for dogs!”
“Oh, well I wish they would write that on the label then!”

I also kind of hate to admit it, but there are often some “racist incidents” that happen on the train. While walking to the Brewster train station, I stood in the crosswalk waiting for the cars to go by. It is starting to get warmer, so people have their windows down… and the man shouted out the window at me, “I’ll only stop for you because you’re a white girl!” If you’ve ever been to Brewster, you might have an idea of why this disgruntled man made this comment.

A recent article I read talks about convicts traveling by Greyhound bus. I’ve certainly commented about that in this blog. Greyhound feigns ignorance, but I could have told them that ages ago after taking a 30 day cross country trip via Greyhound. Many people talked about being in prison, leaving prison, etc. Now if it were me, I wouldn’t be telling a bunch of random people on the bus about being a felon or anything like that. So you must imagine for each person that told everyone about their criminal past, there might have been quite a few others keeping their mouths shut!

Don’t get lost in Boston. The cops you might ask for directions from aren’t the most helpful. While traveling with several other girls, we were looking for a place on Channel St. The policeman we asked made it a point to inform us that we were stupid girls and that we were looking for “CHANNEL and not CHANEL.” Yes, because Chanel is ALL we think about.

On the train home this evening, I sat next to a woman who after one stop, turned to me and asked, “Is this train going to New York?” Unfortunately it wasn’t. She had gotten on the wrong train.

It made me think back to a few times when I got on the wrong train. When I first started commuting to work, I got on a train in Brewster that apparently went express after a few stops and didn’t stop at White Plains. For the record, that was the first and only time I had ever been on a Harlem Line train that did not make a stop there. I was lucky enough to have a really nice conductor… he stopped the express train at White Plains just so I could get off. People at work joked around, if I looked more like my age or older (as opposed to looking like a 15-year-old or something) would he have still done the same thing?

Another time I got on the wrong train was when I was riding the Long Island Railroad from Northport station. Northport has only one track, so unless you are observant and notice the direction the train pulls into the station, you don’t necessarily know in which direction it will be heading. I arrived at the station exactly at the time my train was supposed to leave. There was a train on the tracks waiting, and my friend who dropped me off was like, “Run! You can catch it!” I ran my little ass off and did in fact catch it… Only to find out as the doors closed that the train was heading to Port Jefferson, as opposed to Penn Station. My train was late, and was waiting on an other track outside the station for this train to leave so it could pull up. I managed to get off at King’s Park, the next station…

I didn’t, nor do I even now know where the hell King’s Park is, but I knew I certainly didn’t want to be there. I think this was back before I had a cell phone, so I was looking for a telephone booth to call my friend for help. A scruffy looking old man stood in front of the phone booth. By the time I awkwardly got him to move away from it, I saw that the phone receiver had been cut off by a vandal, and there was just a wire hanging where it should have been. Yeah, that was a spectacular afternoon.

While waiting on the platform, I noticed a woman acting a little strangely while pushing a baby carriage. Not like, strange enough to call the police or something, but just odd. She was pushing the carriage, but it was covered over with a large blanket. If a kid was inside, it would have been suffocating. Every couple of minutes, she would kneel down over the carriage, lift the flap, stick her head inside, and talk. Actually, thinking back, it was pretty damn weird. You see those “See Something, Say Something” posters everywhere, and that was kinda suspicious…

Once we got on the train though, I did happen to notice that the woman wasn’t talking to a bomb or anything like that… she was attempting to conceal a cat strapped into the baby carriage.

I am a lover of hats… they keep me warm. I have a grand collection of them, plain hats, silly hats with ears, all varieties. Several years ago I made frequent use of a baby blue hat, which had a black unicorn embroidered on the front. Perhaps these hats are what attracts the weirdos to me.

One evening while taking the PATH train to New Jersey, a man attempted to steal the hat off my head while I was walking up the stairs, and he was going down.

Okay, that is fairly tame… and not that odd. The next one? A little more strange. It certainly is one of my favorite stories to tell about weird people I’ve encountered on the train. I was riding Metro North from Brewster station, and a somewhat overweight woman decided to sit next to me.

“You must like unicorns,” she said.
“Umm yeah, I guess…”
“Oh, I bet you’d love this…”

She then proceeded to unbutton her shirt, in order to show me a tattoo right above her breast. Of a unicorn. But it was far more than I wanted to see…

[pdf-ppt-viewer href="http://www.iridetheharlemline.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/1895_harlemdivision2.pdf" width="600" height="500"]

Excerpt from Health and pleasure on “America’s greatest railroad.”
By New York Central and Hudson River Railroad Company
Found on Google Books